


Despite Darker Tendencies

by geckoholic



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Captivity, Captured Together, Hurt Dick Grayson, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Major Character Injury, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Past Relationship(s), Revenge killing, bruised and battered, internal bleeding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-01 14:38:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18802336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/pseuds/geckoholic
Summary: Jason wakes up drugged and nauseous in a dark basement. He soon finds that he isn't alone.





	Despite Darker Tendencies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Zaatar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zaatar/gifts).



> You picked "any" for tags and I took your optional details to mean you wanted something with dire circumstances involving a complicated relationship between the two, so I went in deep. I hope this what you were looking for!
> 
> Beta-read by volavi. Thank you!! ♥ All remaining mistakes are mine.
> 
> Title is from "Lose Your Head" by Bad Religion.

The world feels like it's tilted off its axis, like it can't decide which side is up. Jason raises his hand up before his eyes and can't even focus on the shape, his vision swimming. His head aches. His stomach his tied into knots, bile rising in his throat. He pushes himself up, halfway to a stand, but has to abandon the attempt in order to avoid emptying his stomach onto the cold stone floor. He swallows a few times to fight the overwhelming nausea down, and then concentrates on forcing the blurry fog out of his head. Calm down. Take stock. Map his surroundings. This is far from the scariest way he's ever woken up. He was trained for worse. 

He's in a dark room with naked stone walls. Light only drifts in from a slit underneath the door, and that's also where a slight draft stems from, the only source of fresh air. It reeks faintly of mildew and old dust. The only discernible outside sound is the faint hum of a radio from beyond the hallway, playing modern music, and the bits of moderation in between sound like English. No traffic noise, though, no chatter, no other hints to his captors or his location. His first guess is a basement, maybe in the suburbs or one of the old buildings in the city center, old and abandoned or not regularly used. 

Jason closes his eyes and lets his head fall back against the wall. Getting out of here shouldn't be too much of a hassle, once the effects of whatever he's been shot up with have started to lessen. And he's rather certain he's been drugged; he's had enough concussions to know the difference. Something strong, too, or experimental. He's got a tolerance for most of the common stuff. 

It takes him a few moments to settle down and notice the sound of another person's breathing from the far side of room, shallow, like they're still unconscious. Carefully, to avoid another bout of nausea, Jason gets up on all four and crawls over to the source of the sound. There's a chance that this is a trap, an attacker in disguise, but he banks on the other captive being an ally. Either way, they're still out like a light, being that far gone can't be faked, and that means Jason has a chance to get some hints on their identity before he tries to shake them awake. 

Once he reaches them, he feels around in the dark, and frowns when he touches the person's knee. The material that's covering his or her knee is familiar, and found in only one place: the batcave. He'd recognize the smooth, deceptively thin kevlar alloy anywhere. He feels his way up, looking for a hint as to which of the Bats he's locked in with. A belt, but they all wear one. The chest is flat, so it's one of the guys. He feels the ridge of an emblem in the area around his pecs, and lets his fingers follow the outline. 

It's a chevron, reaching over the whole width of his chest, and for a second Jason thinks he can make out its bright blue color despite the pitch dark room, reality overlaid with memory. Dick. That's Dick. 

Which means they're not allies anymore, precisely; as far as backup goes, however, he couldn't have picked anyone better. Jason dares think that his chances of getting out of here weren't all that awful to begin with, but they just doubled, if not tripled.

He presses two fingers to Dick's neck just above the edge of his suit, finding a steady pulse. He squeezes Dick's shoulder, shacking him. When that doesn't yield a reaction, he slaps Dick's cheek with a flat hand, once on each side. Dick stirs, if weakly, and Jason proceeds to shake him some more. “Hey, Nightwing,” he whispers, close to Dick's ear. “Hey hey, wake up.” 

Dick groans, one hand going up to press against his temple, and blinks at him slowly. “Jas-” he starts, but then catches himself. “Wait, it's Red Hood these days, isn't it?” 

His expression darkens, his voice bleeds sarcasm, and Jason has to take a moment, fight down a sour wave of resentment that's almost as powerful as the nausea from the drugs. “Fuck you, too.” 

Dick chuckles – or tries, anyway, but it ends in a cough. He's got one hand pressed to his side and it's instinct more than actual concern that has Jason push his hand away and feel around for blood, fresh or dried, staining the suit. He doesn't find any, but Dick's yelp when he pokes at the spot tells him that he's got a fat bruise there at the very least. 

“Your bedside manners haven't improved either,” Dick says, and Jason pokes him one more time out of spite. Dick bats his hand away and Jason retreats, shifting around to sit down next to him. 

They sit in silence as Dick presumably runs through the same assessments Jason did earlier. Surroundings, noise, chances of escape, type of drug. He scowls once he's done, letting out a sigh. 

“I guess you don't have any idea where we are, then, either?” Jason comments, and Dick chuckles. 

“You tell me, you woke up first.” He sits up straighter, hissing as that must have jarred the bruise on his side. “Seen anyone yet? Any clue asto who we're dealing with?” 

Jason opens his mouth to reply that, nope, he hasn't seen a soul, but the words die in his throat when he hears footsteps in the hallway, joined by a whistle as whoever it is closes in on their temporary prison. It's a lighthearted melody, a stark contrast to their situation, to the dark and dank room they're held in. The door opens and the light falling in from the hallway doesn't let them see more than the silhouette of their captor. The whistling stops and Jason is the first to try and get to his feet, headache and nausea be damned, but he's stopped by the touch of a weapon and an electric current running through his body, immobilizing him. 

The sensation is vaguely familiar from recent memory. Dick's escrima sticks. The shithead must have snatched those when he put them both in here. 

“No worries, red bird,” an unfamiliar voice chides, “it'll be your turn soon. Good things come to those who wait.” 

Another shock from the escrima sticks makes Jason curl up on the ground, unable to do anything but watch as their captor delivers a series of shocks to Dick as well and then yanks him to a stand with a hand around his upper arm. He winces in pain while he's dragged along, out of the room, and Jason curses when the door falls closed behind them, leaving him alone in the darkness. 

 

***

 

He hears Dick scream. Several times, at random intervals, and the fact that he doesn't know what's going on, what's being done to him, somehow makes it worse. Not because the implied threat that the same thing might be waiting for him, but... 

But it's Dick. And one thing his stint as Robin ingrained into him, intentional or not, is that if there's something that Dick can't withstand, can't deal with, can't conquer and overcome, then Jason doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell to do better. 

He shakes his head. He's older now. Everything's different. In the last couple of years he dealt with a shitload of stuff that neither Dick nor the Bat could ever _imagine_. The kid from back then went through hell and came out the other end alive and stronger than ever. Robin is long dead, and the Red Hood can survive fucking anything. 

The screams still set his teeth on edge. But he refuses to consider other reasons for that reaction, for the way every blood-curling scream makes him ache in sympathy. _Robin is dead_ and the Red Hood doesn't share anything with Dick. They mean nothing to each other, these days. Their past doesn't matter. He closes his eyes, grits his teeth, and tries to ignore it all; the screams as well as their echo within him. 

 

***

 

He has no way of tracking time, and he doesn't know how long it's been when the door opens again and Dick is thrown back into the room, carelessly, with no regard to where he lands or how it hurts him; discarded like yesterday's trash. There's a viscous, vindictive part in Jason that would usually jeer at seeing the golden boy fall, but right now it's on vacation, relegated to the cheap seats by his survival instincts and the strange sense of nostalgia that makes him forget they're supposed to be at odds. Losing Dick in here would not only worsen his acute chances of escape, it'd also mean a whole ass full of trouble when the Bat finds out that they were together when Dick died – that Jason survived and Dick didn't. 

He squints into the darkness to take stock of the state Dick's in, try and find cues as to what might have happened to him and how the puzzle pieces might fight together. His eyes have adjusted to near-darkness, and he can make out a little more details than before. Dick is out of his suit, that much he's certain about, although he can't tell whether he's naked or still wearing his underwear. He's curled into himself like a baby in the womb, a vulnerable position that looks wrong on Jason's cocksure, happy-go-lucky predecessor. He doesn't seem bound or shackled. 

Jason crawls over to where Dick landed. He touches Dick's cheek, then just underneath his jaw to check his pulse again – weaker than before – and Dick whines, flinching away. Jason tries not to take it personally. 

“What happened?” he asks, trying to keep his voice gentle and soothing. Young, like the boy Dick knew, the boy Dick trusted. “What did he do to you? Are you hurt?” 

Slowly, inch by inch, Dick manages to unfold himself. He reaches for Jason's hand, squeezing it so tight it hurts. He takes a few deep breaths, and his voice sounds hoarse when he answers. “A single room after a short hallways, with connecting doors to a flight of stairs, if the signs are to be believed. Made up to look like a lab, lots of stuffed birds and ornithology spreads describing different types of birds. He put me on a slab, stripped me, tied me down, and he...” His voice breaks on a bitten-off sob. Jason fears the worst, fears the unspeakable, but Dick just shakes his head and inhales deeply a few times in a row. “He shocked me, again and again, electrical shocks from something that looked liked makeshift medical equipment, and he was babbling about wanting to help me learn how to fly. He's a goddamn lunatic. Jason. He wants us to _fly_ , he said, wants to make us real robins.” 

A report, rattling down everything he thought might be important. The old man would be so proud. And yet, he's still leaving out a vital piece of information, guarding the extend of his injuries from a lower enemy. Mistrust, which, even if Jason earned it in spades, they can't afford right now. Dick's posture still speaks volumes; he's badly injured, but he doesn't want Jason to know. 

“Where are you hurt?” Jason presses again, more urgently this time. “Tell me. I can't account for that in our escape plan if I don't know what's wrong with you.” 

Dick tilts his head at him at the words _escape plan_ , and Jason's distaste for being measured up against the golden boy and falling short flares back up. He could just be doubting the suggestion that Jason wants to help him. It doesn't have to be that he doubts Jason's ability to get them out of here. 

After a few beats of strained silence, Dick sighs. He uncurls completely, laid out flat on his back, and nods towards the corner where they sat together before he got taken to the lab. “I hid a small flashlight there, underneath a loose brick. Can you get it?” 

Jason nods, and hauls himself up to a stand. Walking is still a bit of a brittle affair, but the nausea has begun to abate and it's getting easier. He feels around for the loose brick and, yeah, voila, there it is. He doesn't switch it on yet and returns to where Dick is laying down, holds it out to him once he's there. 

But Dick shakes his head, instead directs Jason's hand to hover over his upper abdomen, not far from the spot he's been guarding already before he was taken to the lab. “You look. I can't bend far enough to check it out myself. Hurts too much.” 

Swallowing hard, Jason switches the flashlight on and shines it onto Dick's body. Dick is, indeed, naked, and Jason does his best to afford him the privacy of not glancing towards his crotch. Been there, done that, after all, nothing new to see, and it prompts an unexpected twinge of loss, to think about all that was burned out of him when he died. When no one came for him. When no one deemed him important enough to exact revenge. 

He banishes those thoughts to the back of his head and focuses on the task at hand. He was right about the bruise earlier, and it's a big and colorful one, stretching from Dick's hips to his belly button. A hand's width above that, he can see the red discoloration of a first degree burn, spreading out from a small, circular point of contact that's marked by a small smattering of blisters. And while that's bad, it wouldn't leave Dick in such a state. They're used to pain. No, the concerning part is that the burn is located just above Dick's left kidney. And if the electrical current was strong enough, inflicted for too long... 

He snaps his fingers in front of Dick's face, displeased by how long it takes for Dick to turn his head and look at the source of the noise. He presses two fingers to Dick's wrist and properly counts off his pulse, finding that his blood pressure has decreased yet again. He feels Dick's forehead, and curses underneath his breath. His temperature is rising above normal as well, approaching an almost feverish heat. 

There's little point in asking Dick whether he's feeling nauseous or close to vomiting, seeing how that's already been an effect of the drug they've been given. Jason feels around the edge of the burn; the muscles tighten and contract under his touch. He glances towards Dick's face, the way his eyes keep threatening to flutter shut. 

Internal bleeding, he's rather sure. Maybe a ruptured kidney. Worst case, he'll need surgery, and soon, but even if it's not that bad the severe the pain will have him out of commission for a while, which makes him a burden rather than an asset. _Shit._

Of course, there's also the option of leaving him here, but Jason can't even bring himself to consider that path. He'll tell himself, later, that it's fear of repercussions from the Bat rather than a misplaced sense of nostalgia that makes the idea of abandoning Dick seem impossible, but the result is the same; Jason will not leave him behind. 

He shucks off his jacket and wraps it around Dick's shoulders, then maneuvers him into his lap, and it's a bit worrying how little resistance Dick puts up at this point. He won't think about that, nor about how familiar the position and the proximity still feel, after everything. He doesn't know how much time he has until their captor comes for him next, and he goes over the details Dick gave him again – single captor, doctory type, torture lab, the hallway and the lab to get through in order to reach stairs that lead to hell-knows-where – to come up with an escape strategy. 

 

*** 

 

In the end, he opts for brute force. He knows to expect the escrima sticks when their captor appears again, is prepared to avoid them, and the drugs have mostly left his system. The whole thing is over in less than two minutes, and it's so laughably easy it doesn't even deserve to be called a fight. He looks down at the prone figure of their captor, crumbled into a sad heap of human garbage in almost the exact spot that Dick had lain before, and his past and present moral codes go to war with each other in his thoughts for a moment. The guy is mad. Cruel. He's seen them without their masks. Even if they send the cops over immediately, like the old man would want, and he'd never see outside of a prison ever again, he could still wreak havoc in their lives. In Dick's life, more specifically, since there's not much Jason has left to lose. Jason could pretend he doesn't care all day long, will attempt to do exactly that as soon as they've made it out of here, but, even so, there's a difference between playing cat and mouse with Dick as Nightwing, threatening to kill him, threatening to make their lives hell, and to unmasking a vigilante. All games have rules. Some truths are a worse betrayal than switching sides to villainy and murder. 

His gaze falls to Dick, who's barely conscious at this point, face twisted in pain. Emotions seize his heart, and he'll lock them away again tomorrow, but the thing is, a third-rate lunatic doesn't have the right to hurt someone who once meant the world to Jason. Not like this, and not by revealing their secrets. He can't allow it. He _won't_ allow it. 

Jason kneels beside the unconscious wannabe doctor and, without ceremony or second thought, snaps his neck. Then he walks back over to Dick and gathers him into his arms. He'll deliver him to the Manor, leave him at their doorstep. He won't look back, and he won't inquire after him through whatever means. They'll see each other again soon enough, on opposing sides of the line their mentor drew for them when they were teenagers, the line Dick still respects and Jason strode past long ago.

He doesn't need more evidence for that fact, for how wide the rift between them is these days, than the dead body he steps over on their way to safety. The Bat will hate him for it. Dick will hate him for it, even more than he already does, but at least he'll be alive to do it and remain safely hidden from the world by his public persona. 

And nothing will have changed, for better or worse.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [dreamwidth](https://geckoholic.dreamwidth.org/), [tumblr](http://lostemotion.tumblr.com) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/spacenerdz).


End file.
